Gadhafi’s Cluster Bombs–and Uncle Sam’s

“Gadhafi Troops Fire Cluster Bombs Into Civilian Areas,” declares a New York Times headline (4/15/11). The lead of the story makes clear that these weapons are considered in many countries to be illegal:

Military forces loyal to Col. Moammar el-Gadhafi have been firing into residential neighborhoods in this embattled city with heavy weapons, including cluster bombs that have been banned by much of the world.

The story, by C.J. Chivers, goes on to explain why these weapons have been banned:

These so-called indiscriminate weapons, which strike large areas with a dense succession of high-explosive munitions, by their nature cannot be fired precisely. When fired into populated areas, they place civilians at grave risk.

Then it gives a graphic description of the human toll of these weapons:

The dangers were evident beside one of the impact craters on Friday, where eight people had been killed while standing in a bread line. Where a crowd had assembled for food, bits of human flesh had been blasted against a cinder-block wall.

And it strongly suggests that the use of cluster bombs deserves to have serious international consequences:

The use of such weapons in these ways could add urgency to the arguments by Britain and France that the alliance needs to step up attacks on the Gadhafi forces, to better fulfill the United Nations mandate to protect civilians.

After all this, the story gets out of the way an awkward fact that complicates this presentation of the use of cluster bombs as proof that Moammar Gadhafi is an international outlaw whose bloodthirstiness must be countered by an intensified military campaign by the civilized world:

At the same time, the United States has used cluster munitions itself, in battlefield situations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and in a strike on suspected militants in Yemen in 2009.

Oh–so these “indiscriminate weapons” that “place civilians at grave risk” have been used by the United States as well? But only in “battlefield situations,” far from civilians, right? Well, not exactly. The U.S. was criticized by Human Rights Watch for using cluster bombs in populated areas in Afghanistan, killing and injuring scores of civilians (Washington Post, 12/18/02). Amnesty International (4/2/03) called the U.S.’s use of cluster bombs in civilian areas of Iraq “a grave violation of international humanitarian law.” (See FAIR Action Alert, 5/6/03.) NATO employed cluster bombs in its bombing of Serbia during the Kosovo War, with one attack killing 15 civilians in the town of Nis (BBC, 5/7/99); more than 2,000 unexploded munitions from cluster bombs are estimated to remain on Serbian territory, continuing to endanger civilians (AFP, 3/10/09).

The “suspected militants” attacked by a cluster bomb in Yemen in 2009 turned out to be “21 children and 20 innocent women and men” (NewYorkTimes.com, 12/9/10)–all killed in the U.S. attack.

You can be sure that none of these examples of U.S. use of cluster bombs in civilian areas prompted the New York Times to suggest that they justified military attacks on the United States in order to protect civilians. And you’d be hard-pressed to find any descriptions in the Times of the “bits of human flesh” resulting from any U.S. military action.

As for cluster bombs being “banned in much of the world,” that includes Britain. But as WikiLeaks revealed, the U.S. colluded with the British government to circumvent the ban and allow U.S. cluster bombs to remain on British soil. WikiLeaks also disclosed that the U.S. has been lobbying for countries to keep cluster bombs legal, arguing that they are “legitimate weapons that provide a vital military capability” (Guardian, 12/1/10).

Extra! Magazine Editor Since 1990, Jim Naureckas has been the editor of Extra!, FAIR's monthly journal of media criticism. He is the co-author of The Way Things Aren't: Rush Limbaugh's Reign of Error, and co-editor of The FAIR Reader: An Extra! Review of Press and Politics in the '90s. He is also the co-manager of FAIR's website. He has worked as an investigative reporter for the newspaper In These Times, where he covered the Iran-Contra scandal, and was managing editor of the Washington Report on the Hemisphere, a newsletter on Latin America. Jim was born in Libertyville, Illinois, in 1964, and graduated from Stanford University in 1985 with a bachelor's degree in political science. Since 1997 he has been married to Janine Jackson, FAIR's program director. You can follow Jim on Twitter at @JNaureckas.

[…] The New York Times cries foul, claiming that Libyan government forces used GRADs and Spanish 120mm cluster shells to prevent ships from being unloaded from Misrata port. Reuters reports, that Libyan government […]

Let’s keep in mind that for some years, the good Colonel had been a member in good standing in our brutal buddy system, hadn’t he?

He had those munitions at his command during that period, didn’t he?

Had he used them against those opposed to his rule – and I don’t have the intel at hand to say this didn’t occur – what do you think the response from the US and the West would have been?

None of this is to exculpate his regime. If using cluster bombs in civilian areas isn’t legally a war crime, it certainly is from any moral standpoint. But this “humanitarian intervention” heaps hypocrisy upon hypocrisy, and in the end, whatever short-term benefit Libyans may derive from it will be outweighed in the end by the quid pro quo exacted for it, don’t you think?

[…] The New York Times cries foul, claiming that Libyan government forces used GRADs and Spanish 120mm cluster shells to prevent ships from being unloaded from Misrata port. Reuters reports, that Libyan government […]

Stuff like this — http://www.rawa.org/cluster2.htm — isn’t exactly new either. I’ve been reading reports about children being hurt or killed by cluster bomblets they picked up for years. Time for a blog post!

Good article. But you leave out that Israel dropped thousands of cluster bombs on Lebanon in 2006. And who sold those cluster bombs to Israel?

All wars are acts of terrorism. But if we define one army fighting another army as traditional (i.e. non terrorist) warfare, that is, each army having a specific military target, namely the other army, then we have to define the use of cluster bombs and land mines, which hit indescriminantly, terrorist weapons. What does that make the state of Israel, and even more so the US?

I’m reminded of the movie “Lord of War” with Nocholas Cage in the starring role. There is a disclaimer at the end that 5 countries supply most of the world with its arms. What the disclaimer doesn’t point out is that the US controls by itself 40% of the world market. So that means on average the other four countries each supply about 15%.

I think we should go further in questioning the framing of this issue. The NYT is notorious as a promoter of US wars and a facilitator of war propaganda. This to me looks like a slick and manipulative anti-Gaddafi frame-up. It starts with the misleading introductory photo, which shows a gaping hole in a wall and blames the damage on “Libyan forces”. Cluster bombs are anti-personnel shrapnel devices which do not create 1+ meter diameter holes in concrete walls. So what does the photo prove about a cluster bomb attack? Nothing. It’s a red herring.

Setting aside the multiple questions that could be raised about the veracity of the reporting of this event, there is actually zero proof that this was done by Gaddafi troops. There is a report of deaths caused by cluster bombs, and the NYT pronounces Gaddafi guilty. This is the sheerest innuendo. Despite indicating that use of these weapons occurred in the midst of rebel and loyalist battles, the NYT utterly and damnably ignores the possibility this weapon’s use could have come from the rebels or their air support.

All along Gadaffi has been promoted as either engaged in the slaughter of civilians (a yet-unproven allegation, and one made in the context of civil war) or on the verge of doing so. So this framing of Gaddafi as a cluster-bomb villain fits into the context of US-NATO war propagandizing, which has been biased and fraudulent from the beginning, smearing Gaddafi as insane, bloodthirsty and inhuman “creature” (to use Hillary Clinton’s racist-tinged insult) despite many signal quantifiable improvements in Libyan society since his revolution.

The anti-Gaddafi troops are not lacking for various types of arms, either by seizing Libyan weapons depots or being provided them from abroad. It’s certainly plausible any deployment of cluster bombs was something they did. The cluster bombs are determined to be from Spain, and NATO-integrated Spain is taking the anti-Gaddafi side. Notice that no proof of sale or transfer of the Spanish cluster bombs to the Libyan government is provided, although it’s strenuously implied by the reporter.

The other possibility is that this was a botched NATO air attack. US-NATO are the only parties involved in this affair with a history of previous use of the dreadful cluster bombs not only in war but against civilians.

A final note regarding a comment — again Doug L., who postures as a “corpress” critic, gets led by the nose by the NYT corpress and jumps (as he’s prone to) on the Gaddafi demonization campaign bandwagon. Check his quote:

“…He had those munitions at his command during that period [of rapproachment with imperialism], didn’t he? Had he used them against those opposed to his rule ÃƒÆ’Â¢ÃƒÂ¢”Å¡Â¬“ and I don’t have the intel at hand to say this didn’t occur…”

Guilty until proven innocent, Doug L.? It’s not been established that Gaddafi actually had those munitions, let alone used them. Is this how citizens of NATO regimes function — posing, unethical and gullible while presuming to cast anathemas on both the NATO targets and the NATO targeting?

I’ve noticed another “out” U.S. officials, such as Hilary Clinton, use when abhorring acts by Ghaddaffi and others that the United States also commits. “He used cluster bombs against his own people!” I have heard this “his own people” tag used repeatedly. It seems obvious that it’s role is to disable the obvious retort that the U.S. does the same thing. We may routinely slaughter masses of civilians, but at least they’re not our own people! What fine minds our politicians have to be able to make such distinctions…

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